Superficial
by Ravyn Starkweather
Summary: Twisted Metal: Black character Billy Ray has moved into the city after Calypso's contest. It's a strange place to him, but the city's superficial nature angers him the most...


SUPERFICIAL

He didn't want to look in my face and I could tell. Most people tried to be polite and not look, but they made it so obvious that I almost wished they would just stare. As the man talked to me, he kept his head down, his eyes averted.

"So…where are you from?" He asked me, still looking down at the grass. I was in the middle of working behind the large field behind the high school when he came up to me. I had purchased the field awhile ago, missing the simple country life. I wanted to grow crops and plants again like in the old days, but with this big city pollution, who knew if they'd even come out?

The school in front of the field hired me as their groundskeeper. After hours, of course, so the kids wouldn't see me. Actually, it wasn't a bad job. All I had to do was maintain the upkeep of the lawns. It was fun, really.

Anyway, this man came up to me as I was working, trimming the edges of the field. I had never seen him before in my life and here he was, trying to make small talk with me.

Out in the country, you didn't talk unless you had something important to say, but these people never seemed to shut up.

"Where you from?" He asked me again. Maybe he thought I was dumb as well as ugly, because he talked really slow.

"I'm from the country…" I answered in my gentle accent, not wanting to give more information than I needed to. "Why?" I asked.

"No reason," He started talking faster as he realized that I wasn't as dumb as he thought I was, "I just noticed you working out here the last couple of weeks. I must say I admire what you're doing…"

"Is that right?" I asked him, wiping sweat out of my small, dark eyes.

"Yea, yea, it is." He said, "I've just been wondering, is this always what you've wanted to do? I mean, working outside, manual labor?"

"No offense, mister, but where I come from, we don't give too much information to people we don't even know. Who are you?" I asked him.

"Oh, my apologies. I'm Doctor Miles Winston. Like I said, I've been seeing you around here, working."

"Yea, you mentioned that…" I said quietly.

"Well, like I said, is this always what you've wanted to—" He stopped mid-sentence. "Oh, where are my manners today? What's your name?"

"I'm Billy Ray." I answered. I almost extended my hand as I did every time I introduced myself, but something made me not want to touch the man in front of me. This Doctor Winston gave me strange vibes.

"Nice to meet you, Billy Ray." He said, in an almost condescending tone.

I stared at him. I could tell he was waiting on me to answer his question.

"Oh, yes, this is always what I've wanted to do. It's what I did back home, too. I raised crops. Better conditions down there, though…" I said.

"This is what you've always wanted to do…" The doctor repeated to himself. "So, you've never been discriminated against because of your…your…" He stopped himself, still trying to be politically correct.

"Why would I be discriminated against, sir?" I asked, trying to keep my tone even. I felt the twitch behind my right eye start again. I closed my eyes for a second, trying to resist the urge to kill this stupid man in front of me right then and there. The road that ran parallel to my field was empty at the moment, but I didn't want to take the chance. So I closed my eyes and tried to wait for the twitching to stop. It wouldn't.

"What I'm trying to say is…Were you in an accident sometime in your life or were you born this way?" He asked me, daring to make eye-contact for a brief second, then finding solace in the grass once again.

"Why do you ask?" I demanded as he grew closer and closer to the touchy subject.

"I have good reason to ask, Billy Ray. Would you please answer the question?" He said, becoming increasingly impatient. I think the man's true self was coming out right in front of me. His veil of politically correctness, no doubt inherited with some sort of family money, was beginning to fall.

"I was checking my crops one day down in the country. The corn was coming in nicely, I remember. Well, my wife sent me out to check the crops, like I said, and I was…I was crop dusted when the plane went by…" I explained and the twitching continued to grow stronger.

"Don't they tell you when they're going to be crop dusting?" The doctor questioned, taken aback by my story.

"Yea, it was unscheduled, I guess." I said, not wanting to share the rest of my pain with this man I had known for a grand total of three minutes.

"And your wife sent you out there? I'm sure it's hard for her to live with the guilt…"

"No, the guilt doesn't really effect her anymore. Not where she is…" I said, a smile crossing over my face.

An awkward silence passed as I reminisced on giving Annie what she had deserved.

A thought brought me back to reality.

"Why did you ask me about the accident? You said you had good reason…" I pondered aloud.

"Well, Billy Ray, I'm a plastic surgeon. I thought perhaps you would want to take advantage of my services." He said, becoming slightly nervous.

My eyes widened. I couldn't believe the audacity of the little man in front of me. That's what I hated about the big city. Everyone was so hung up on the look of things. The vanity angered me. I stood for the opposite of what everyone here did and this man was just a constant reminder of that. I looked down at the weed eater in my hand and envisioned murdering the superficial man in front of me.

My mind couldn't wrap around what he was proposing me. People around here couldn't just let things happen naturally. They always had to perfect themselves to meet up to someone else's standard. I had grown accustomed to my face. It was a reminder of what can happen…A reminder not to trust.

I stared at him. He could see the wheels turning in my old fashioned mind.

"Look, Billy Ray, I'm sorry if I offended you in any way. I'm just trying to help."

"I don't need your help, mister. I think it'd be best for you to take yourself off my property." I said, beginning to turn back to my work.

"I understand, but—"

The weed eater began turning into a weapon before my eyes.

"I really think you should leave." The foolish man didn't understand that I was trying to spare his life. One more word and he was signing his own death certificate.

"Just take this, please." He slipped a business card into the breast pocket of my overalls.

That was it.


End file.
